IndianMag

Great great point! Someone made a very good point about how Newcastle of 2-3 years ago would not have the belief to come back from a goal down at a place like Goodison Park against a very good Everton team. All in all, will take the point, we have 5 points in 4 games. Let's not forget that we have 3 very difficult fixtures out of the way though - Tot(h), Che (a) and Eve(a). We now have a reasonably easy run of fixtures where we can look to accumulate points. Absolute tactical masterclass from Pards. The change of formation and Anita at RB, Perch in CM. Even though it is early days, Anita looks much better at RB. Never been a big fan of Perchinho at full-back, some of his worst displays have been in this position. I think he should play as cover for CM and CB, but shouldn't be considered in a full-back position before Anita. Defence looked shaky. Taylor has looked a little slow on the turn since his comeback, Williamson was quite sluggish, but Santon was the boss today. Defended fantastically and was a real threat going forward, even though he should work on his final ball a little more. Benny looked a little off-colour today, but that's ok, he's entitled to the odd off game. I fully expect him to run Norwich ragged on the weekend. Papiss wasn't at his best, but he will be back. Every striker in the world goes through some barren phases, and this is hardly a phase is it? It has just been 5 odd games without a goal for Papiss. Felt his movement was better than the previous 3 games though. Ba! What a player. He looked energetic, strong, held up play brilliantly, made some fantastic runs. We still haven't seen Ba and Cisse at their best together. Can you imagine what will happen if they peak at the same time? I reckon Premiership defences will surely be quaking their boots.

Where's everyone getting this stuff about Obertan refusing to come on?

Apart from Tav, it's the line-up I wanted. Will be interesting to see if they do line up this way or with the 4-3-3. I think it'll be the 4-3-3.

Agree with you mate. Think people are getting paranoid a little too soon. Yes, we haven't played the best football yet, but we managed to graft a lot of results last year without playing good football. The only spell where we played good football last season was towards the end when we regularly played the fluid 4-3-3. Think Pards is trying to make the 4-4-2 work with the personnel we have. If it doesn't work soon, I have no doubt that he'll switch to the 4-3-3 again. In the meantime, let's hope the system works.

Yes, perhaps but I would really like to see Ben Arfa given a central free role. Also, the reason I put in Tav was because I'd like Anita to go back to midfield. Little scared about Bigi coping against a good Everton midfield who are miles better than Villa.

Even th Even though it won't happen, I'd like to see this team being played ----------------Harper Tav---Taylor---Willo---Santon -----------Cabaye---Anita Jonas-------Ben Arfa-------Marveaux -----------------Cisse Of the little I've seen of Tav, he looks quite promising, so would be tempted to throw him into the mix. Would also like to see Ben Arfa return to his preferred no.10 role.

What worries me is the future. If we don't finish the season well, some of our stars could want out. Would we be able to replace them adequately? Ashley could have made a real statement of intent by making 3-4 astute signings to send a message out that we were genuine Champions League contenders. When you have the likes of Scumderland, Southampton, West Sham spending more than us, it makes us ask a few questions about why Ashley isn't ready to spend money. I understand he doesn't want to spend more than a player is worth but surely Debuchy is worth 6-7 Million pounds. We haven't purchased a defender other than Santon for the last 2.5 years and it's a position that has required strengthening for awhile. I don't mean to sound negative, as we weren't overtly happy about our dealings last year at this time, but it turned out to be a great season, so let's wait and see.

He has looked really good in the games he has come on as a sub, which makes me wonder if Pards wants to use him as a good impact player. The couple of games I've seen him start, he has looked anonymous. Having said that, I think he's got some real quality and if we show some faith in him, like we did with Obertan, we could have a fantastic player on our hands. HBA is currently our only creative outlet, and Marv can most definitely be our second creative outlet. Good touch, decent delivery (well better than anyone else's atleast) and smart player (we saw glimpses vs Wigan and Everton last year).

Agree about Bigi. He didn't let the situation faze him at all. He gave the ball away a couple of times cheaply, but other than that, his passing and distribution was good and he made a few vital interceptions and blocks. Seems like a smart player as well. He seems to know where the the players around him are.

Even though Anita was playing out of position, I thought he did quite a decent job. He looked a lot more comfortable attacking than Simpson ever has. Don't get me wrong, I like Simmo defensively, but going forward he's quite poor. To be honest, you can tell he has the attributes to be a decent player, and we'll see that when he gets used to the league.

The one problem I have with Pardew is that we waits for too long to change things around if there is an obvious issue. Take the Obertan, Ben Arfa examples last season for example. I thought it was a bit of a masterstroke to change to 4-3-3 last season and to get Jonas playing CM, so why has Pardew gone back to playing him on the left? We beat Manure and Chelski playing the 4-4-2, so it's not like we can't use the formation to good effect when we need to be a little more direct against the big teams, but against the weaker teams, I think it should always be a 4-3-3. We played some of our best football last season playing the 4-3-3.

Oh, haha! Sorry, didn't get that initially.

Liverpool look so poor when Suarez is not at the top of his game. It just goes to show how much they rely on him, or else they have no creativity upfront. Borini was rubbish and Gerrard looked in and out of the game. Allen on the other hand had quite a decent game. I'm confident that if we keep our players fit this season, we will finish above them.

Vuckic is class to be honest. He looks like he has a neat touch, holds the ball well, gets into nice positions, has a nice shot. Only thing is that he looks a little slow. He has all the attributes to be a good footballer. If he doesn't cut it in England, I'm sure he'll be a good player in another league.

I think he replaced Perch at left-back, he made a couple of good marauding runs forward. He looked quite pacey.

We played the 4-4-2 quite succesfully when we had Carroll & Shola playing upfront, with Barton delivering good crosses into the box. We don't have the delivery anymore and I don't think we don't really have the physical presence either. I think Ba & Cisse need to roughen up a little. They barely win balls in the air and their movement off late has been poor which is surprising considering how good their movement was last year.

This is where we will miss Raylor to be honest. He might not be the best player, but his set-pieces are a lot better than anyone else's.

Thanks a lot for the warm welcome guys! Much appreciated. Another thing I couldn't fathom was Anita on the right and Santon on the left. Anita was decent but he looks more confident on his left than right, which showed when he was attacking. Even though he put in a couple of decent balls with his right (well, better than Simpson's atleast), I'd like to know the reasoning from Pards behind playing wrong footed full-backs on each side. From what I saw of Tavs on Thursday, he looks quite decent going forward. He wasn't really tested defensively when he came on so couldn't tell about that, but I'd like to see him being given a chance at RB with all the injuries.

Hi Guys! New to this board. Been around for quite awhile but never really got down to registering, until today. All in all, quite disappointed with today's performance and result. I don't think Ba and Cisse should be starting together upfront as they occupy exactly the same positions and don't compliment each other well at all. If anything at all, we should consider playing Ba on the left like we did last season. If it were upto me, I'd quite honestly drop one of them next game for Marveaux. Cisse hasn't looked sharp at all and his movement has been quite poor compared to last season, so I'd probably drop him. Once again, we looked completely devoid of any ideas. Either we looped the ball to the two upfront or looked for some inspiration from Ben Messi. Another thing of notice, is our shocking set-pieces. Why is it that time after time, game after game, we are unable to beat the first man either at corners or free kicks. Some of the delivery today was c@ck!!! Everyone tried including Bigi, Cabaye, Marveaux, Ben but the delivery was all poor. I can't understand how at such a senior level, they struggle to beat the first man when it comes to corners.